Selling newspapers – the “Satanic Panic” headlines

Millions of copies of newspapers were sold in the 1980s and 1990s covering numerous ritual crimes including satanic ritual abuse, the media suddenly reversed the coverage and created the “Satanic ritual abuse myth” – selling many more millions of newspapers. Society at that time did not wish to believe in the horrors of incest, so reports of extreme physical and sexual abuse combined, often with satanic/occult influences became a sensationalist topic in the media.

The backlash – confessions ignored as convictions are overturned, “it’s a Myth” headlines

This backlash was based on a highly effective publicity campaign on “false memories” which began when Peter Freyd’s daughter Jennifer Freyd accused him of raping her as a child. Jennifer – a highly respected psychologist – never recanted – but after public appeals and money from others accused of the similar crimes, including convicted pedophiles a media backlash began. Jennifer has never referred to being subjected to ritual abuse yet the Freyd’s latched onto this, and many convictions for ritual abuse were overturned in the United States. Including a huge number of convictions which had including confessions.

Having already done a U-turn in reporting the media now face the tricky situation of writing newspaper articles on a topic they have convinced many people doesn’t exist. Rather than face public embarrassment by admitting they were wrong in the previous U-turn, and having nobody left to blame it on, convictions are only very rarely reported in radio or TV, and all mention of ritual or religious aspects is minimized within the articles, never to be referred to again. Except of course when you can try a claim an “unsafe conviction” – such as the recent press on Fran Keller which suggests she was convicted on physical evidence (rather than witness testimony and a 60 page confession of an accomplice).

Target: Wikipedia and National Newspapers: Abuser Tactics

Abusers want to keep the silence about ritual abuse: if society acknowledges reality and hears about the number of convictions then victims will be encouraged to report them. For abusers previously reported hearing convictions in the media might give their partners, spouses, children, work colleagues room to doubt their self-proclaimed “innocence” and make them wonder about some of the odd behavior they have seen or heard about. Wifes or husbands of those reported: how hard would you look for evidence that your beloved was not involved in activities like torturing, killing and raping children? So there began an anonymous campaign – with the internet as a perfect tool for hiding their identities. And hiding their previous convictions or arrests to.

Key target: wikipedia. How it was done: gradual persistent editing by a large number of people, followed by wikipedia blacklisting the targeted websites for sending spam. It’s highly unlikely that Ellen Lacter, Ph. D. and well respected author, or Neil Brick, therapist, are spammers but once spam (real or faked) is found wikipedia blacklists the site. No appeals process. No evidence provided. Blacklisted forever. Read about it here, with links to the blacklisted sites:

Other targets: all mainstream news websites, via the comments section, scientific and large circulation newspapers via the letters page, cosy relationships with journalists, and best of all journalists ‘specializing’ in printing that ritual abuse is a myth. Articles attempt to make out the falsely accused (yet mentally well) adults are somehow “victims” and talk of “families torn apart” yet never about rape, torture, murders or helping those who reported the abuse.

Enter the Skeptics

The skeptics seem to doubt all mainstream news so they became a perfect target to get involved, as well as a perfectly “acceptable” place for abusers to discrediting any accounts of convictions that appeared. Being a ‘skeptic’ seems to have a social aspect and very few have any scientific qualifications or academic background despite their strong convictions; quoting exclusively from the internet is common.
Classic examples Skeptics in the Pub, the JREF Randi forum (a place for the “false memory” fans to feel at home now their organization has lost it’s Philadelphia office), and the UK’s biggest skeptic magazine Private Eye.

The title of this thread, and much of the commentary, sound neither objective or skeptical. Rather, this conversation more than hints at a confirmation bias, apparently born of a deeply held belief, e.g. ritual abuse does not exist so this case must be a hoax.

I’d like to understand the rules here. Are there other scenarios in which child abuse just cannot happen? If a pedophile wears a clown suit, does the abuse not happen because everybody knows there’s no such thing as clown abuse?

When the UK’s biggest known pedophile hits the headlines in the national press (one newspaper only printed this despite the credible source) the Private Eye backlash ran the March 2013 story SATANIC PANIC – Familiar Ritual (issue 1334) stating that

“no physical, forensic corroborating evidence has been produced anywhere in the world to substantiate the existence of Satanic ritual abuse”

Jimmy Savile: Satanic ritual abuse – media misinformation

Exposed: Jimmy Savile’s satanic ritual
This big headache was dealt with by attacking the source of the information Dr Sinason, avoiding the corroborating medical evidence that her patients were on the hospital wards at the time Savile was abusing others in the that hospital.
Photos used – A huge photo from a movie (thus implying the abuse was fictional) and humorous image of Savile.

Here’s the real image of Savile in his satanic outfit – courtesy of Real Whitby.

And an image from a few months before of a convicted ritualistic sex offender from Cornwall, also in the UK.

It’s time to start questioning not if ritual abuse exists but how we can PREVENT it and HELP the victims heal.